Best place to buy £250 worth of USD?

superman909

SW17 wrote: »

Yes, of the current credit cards in the UK market, Clarity will give you the best rate as they use the MasterCard daily rate without markup and without any non-sterling transaction fees. Of course, interest is charged from day 1 on cash withdrawals, but if you are paying off the balance at month end, this will be minimal on the amount you are planning.

Not sure how much the hotel will pre-authorise on your card, this varies by hotel, some only put something on to cover extras, others might authorise the whole stay.

How long have you had the card? Any chance of asking for a credit limit increase if you've had a good payment history with them?

Only had card a couple of months and I enquirer about a small increase in the credit limit which would help but they said although I have been paying everything off on time they wait until at least five or six months of having the card. As for the interest on ATM withdrawals can I minimise this even further by paying it off within a day or two of withdrawing the cash, I.e. By faster payment on my Halifax online banking account? This would also bring my credit back to the full £500, am I right to think this is probably my best means of using my Clarity card to its full potential?

SW17

superman909 wrote: »

As for the interest on ATM withdrawals can I minimise this even further by paying it off within a day or two of withdrawing the cash, I.e. By faster payment on my Halifax online banking account? This would also bring my credit back to the full £500, am I right to think this is probably my best means of using my Clarity card to its full potential?

Yes, indeed you can, as PeacefulWaters mentions above:

PeacefulWaters wrote: »

Interest charged will be minimal. Make sure you set up any Faster Payments before you depart (and test them) then you can clear the debts quickly while away.

superman909

Sounds like a plan, thank you. How do I confirm my payment method is "faster payment"? I don't see this mentioned anywhere in my Halifax MasterCard account, but there again I just pay it off with my Halifax current reward account, which is all together in the same online banking account so I assume it is already faster paying?

agrinnall

All online payments within the UK from personal accounts use Faster Payments unless you make an effort to use CHAPS, which is normally a charged for service.